Us of All People (2024)

Revue Starlight: The Movie

The stage emulates life and compresses it, setting free skills learned over lifetimes in brief but dazzling displays for the amusement and judgment of others. For the performers, it is the ultimate risk, and some will rise while others must fall. Nowhere is this truer than at the Seisho Music Academy, where music, dance and real weapons all come into play in the creation of the next great Star. Karen and Hikari’s destinies have been linked since a childhood promise, but their journeys here have taken very different paths. Now, after Hikari leaves, Karen must discover who she is without her opposite, while Hikari must rediscover her own course. Nor are they the only girls who must reassess and change if they want to achieve their dreams, as the dance, magic, and swordplay continue!

After Hours

Desperate to escape his mind-numbing routine, uptown Manhattan office worker Paul Hackett ventures downtown for a hookup with a mystery woman.

Satyricon

After his young lover, Gitone, leaves him for another man, Encolpio decides to kill himself, but a sudden earthquake destroys his home before he has a chance to do so. Now wandering around Rome in the time of Nero, Encolpio encounters one bizarre and surreal scene after another.

MICROCYCLE

A surreal, low-budget odyssey through time, space, and toxic relationships.

Santa Sangre

A former circus artist escapes from a mental hospital to rejoin his armless, cult leader mother, and is forced to enact brutal murders in her name.

The Reflecting Skin

In 1950s rural Idaho, a young boy watches helplessly as his friends and brother fall under the spell of a mysterious widow living up the road and becomes convinced that she is a vampire.

The Rainbow Troops

A group of 10 students struggles with poverty and develop hopes for the future in Gantong Village on the farming and tin mining island of Belitung.

Allegro non troppo

The film is a parody of Disney's Fantasia, though possibly more of a challenge to Fantasia than parody status would imply. In the context of this film, "Allegro non Troppo" means Not So Fast!, an interjection meaning "slow down" or "think before you act" and refers to the film's pessimistic view of Western progress (as opposed to the optimism of Disney's original).

Takeshis'

Beat Takeshi lives the busy and sometimes surreal life of a showbiz celebrity. One day he meets his blond lookalike named Kitano, a shy convenience store cashier, who, still an unknown actor, is waiting for his big break. After their paths cross, Kitano seems to begin hallucinating about becoming Beat.

Me + Her

Creating a universe between two small pieces of Cardboard. When Jack and Jill of Cardboard City are separated by Jill's torrid illness, Jack must think outside the box to assure they will be together again.

Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me

In the questionable town of Deer Meadow, Washington, FBI Agent Desmond inexplicably disappears while hunting for the man who murdered a teen girl. The killer is never apprehended, and, after experiencing dark visions and supernatural encounters, Agent Dale Cooper chillingly predicts that the culprit will claim another life. Meanwhile, in the more cozy town of Twin Peaks, hedonistic beauty Laura Palmer hangs with lowlifes and seems destined for a grisly fate.

The Trial

The surreal tale of an unassuming man who is accused of a never-specified crime and shambles through bizarre encounters to escape this nightmare.

The Holy Mountain

The Alchemist assembles together a group of people from all walks of life to represent the planets in the solar system. The occult adept's intention is to put his recruits through strange mystical rites and divest them of their worldly baggage before embarking on a trip to Lotus Island. There they ascend the Holy Mountain to displace the immortal gods who secretly rule the universe.

Silence

After being discovered trying to escape, a woman must survive the night with her abusive girlfriend.

Knives and Skin

In the wake of a high school student's mysterious disappearance, a collective awakening seems to overcome the town's teenage girls, gathering in force until it can no longer be contained.

Preface to a History

A couple, Vlad and Sophy, navigate their relationship as well as their own struggles with mental health in the context of a highly connected, politically uncertain modern world while on a trip to a remote Canadian island in this avant-garde feature film. PREFACE TO A HISTORY, created with a tiny crew of four people, represents an experiment in using minimalist tools to create an overwhelming aesthetic experience in service of a simple, but specifically contemporary, story about two people attempting to navigate a fraying relationship amid all the anxieties and external pressures of modern adulthood in a technologically-interconnected and politically unstable era.

Guaret

Pedro is Mallorcan, born to a mother from Burgos and a father from Mallorca. Due to his distant relationship with his father, Pedro doesn't fully master Mallorcan as a language. He turns to the works of Damià Huguet to remember his father, as only his poems can fill the void left by his death. The poet's words transport Pedro to his childhood and his roots, even though many of the words are unknown to him, despite them belonging to his language. This becomes the driving force behind the protagonist's search for his own identity, his origins, what it means to be a man, father-son relationships, collective identity, and "mallorquinness". Pedro constantly questions the emotions stirred by Huguet's poetry, and, most importantly, who he is and where he belongs.

Fade

Arthur Dichter thinks he is dying of insomnia, but the reality is much more frightening. In this surreal puzzle film, Dichter turns from his wife to a private journal to record his deepest fears. Anna knows her husband lives in a waking nightmare where delusions and reality blend, but is powerless to help him. As Arthur's disease gives way to despair, loneliness, and alienation, he and Anna hang onto their last shred of hope. This atmospheric film explores personal identity, marital discord, and contemporary life, turning narrative and chronology inside out to find the darkest corners of the human spirit. With music from avant-garde legends AMM, Art Bears, and Stephen O'Malley's Ginnungagap.

Pogrzeb Winy

A feature film by Franek Kurzepa

Glimpses of the Outskirts

In an alternate reality where the decline of nations has given rise to corporatist regimes, any trace of culture or tradition is suppressed by these new leaders to prevent the masses from reclaiming a national identity. However, rebel cells have emerged to counteract this agenda.

Three Mirrors Creature's Flashes of Flesh

In the aftermath of an emotional shock, a ruthless high-class manager faces her own abyss, becomes pervaded by a sensory spirit and undertakes a purifying voyage.

Smoked

A man stuck at a dead-end job must reckon with a figure from his past.

Who's With Me?

Marcus, an average young man awakens to find his apartment under quarantine and completely isolated from the outside world. Ominous messages about toxins and evacuations plaster each screen of his various electronic devices, leaving his next door neighbor as the only person he has contact with. Scared, and with few resources, the two try to navigate there way through the indefinite wait - staving off hunger, boredom, and paranoia.

Devil's Beacon

Martín, a young urban raver, is involved in a strange accident on the road on his way to a party in the middle of the Argentine Pampas. Finding refuge in a mysterious country grocery store and sheltered by two strange locals, Martín's paranoia begins to take over him. As the hours progress, his perception begins to distort, unleashing disturbing visions that will lead him to confront the supernatural forces that hide in the night.

PROJECTION

Katie has escaped an abusive household with her dog and younger sister Haley, in exchange for a less than ideal temporary housing environment. They soon realize that someone is too eager to welcome them to the neighborhood.

Flights of Reverie

A British ornithologist seeks answers to a lost civilization while on assignment in Berlin, as an unorthodox band of misfits longing for the next stage of human evolution stand in his way. While humanity's relationship with the environment is tested, a fearless group of Eco-warriors plot the downfall of pseudo-scientists and attempt to stop their illicit wildlife trafficking.

Echo

A reframing of the classic tale of Narcissus, the director draws on snippets of conversation with a trusted friend to muse on gender and identity. Just as shimmers are difficult to grasp as knowable entities, so does the concept of a gendered self feel unknowable except through reflection. Is it Narcissus that Echo truly longs for, or simply the Knowing he possesses when gazing upon himself?

The Surrealist and His Naughty Hand

A film about Finnish artist Kalervo Palsa who was completely neglected by his peers and time.

Once Again (for the very first time)

Repetition is an illusion. Everything is always new. Legendary street dancer DeRay and spoken-word poet and battle rapper Naima explore a powerful love built on recognition and trauma that contains both the potential for inspiration and destruction. Take an electrifying journey through the vibrant and impressionistic experience of their relationship to each other and through their own creative personal voyages in this hip-hop fantasia that opens a door into the choices we all make in our lives.

Boys in the Trees

On Halloween 1997, two estranged teen skaters embark on a surreal journey through their memories, dreams and fears.

Cochlea

Plot unavailable

Tree of Nails

A folktale in Los Angeles.

Moondog Airwaves

On the stormy night of July 5th, 1995, Trick Stuart works the graveyard shift with his plus-sized pal Meathead at the Delta Kream, a 24HR fast food joint. As they practice their brass band routine, a very unexpected visitor arrives.

A Tale of Sorrow and Sadness

A rookie golfer must cope with the stress of fame after a marketing executive transforms her into a sports celebrity.

Red Colored Elegy

Uninvolved with the political movements of the time, Ichiro and Sachiko hope for something better, but they’re no revolutionaries; their spare time is spent drinking, smoking, daydreaming, and sleeping—together and at times with others.

Wowzers

A tormented young woman haunted by a recurring dream is catapulted into a peculiar and deviant world where she is confronted by the duality of her existence.

Jatt Jeona Mour

Kishan, a bandit, is betrayed by his friend, gets arrested and is sent to prison during the British rule in India. The police suspect his wife and brother, Jeona, of aiding Kishan so they torture them mercilessly. The wife is killed, but Jeona escapes, and becomes a bandit. Can he avenge his bhabhi`s death?

A Thousand Waves Away

The people are in turmoil. The ground from which their enchanted garden grows, is trembling. Between bushes and trees, flowerbeds and fountains, everyone has lost their way on their own. Their eyes search for paths, their hands try to remember. Sometimes they spot something. Sometimes they listen. They catch a whisper, a faint promise. They follow the petals downstream. Further.

Anti-Gas Skin

A fresco mixing the satirical, the surreal and the fantastical to portray the social and political evils of today’s Korea. A gas mask-wearing serial killer is spreading terror. Four people are on his tail on election day: Miju – a wolf-girl who leads a sect of youths who are planning their mass suicide, Bosik – a traffic cop who’s convinced he is a super hero, Patrick – a US Marine on the brink of madness following the serial killer’s murder of his Korean girlfriend, and Ju Sanggeun, the favourite of the candidates for the mayoral seat of Seoul, who has received a disturbing death threat. The man behind the mask remains a mystery. The killer is everywhere or perhaps he is simply inside each of us. –Venice Film Festival

Lost Way

Collective experimental film by Team 8mm TENGOKU.